Share

Author:

Tags:

Like the Los Angeles Lakers, the Minnesota Timberwolves have endured a season of debilitating injuries to many of its key players, including Brandon Roy, Ricky Rubio and most notably Kevin Love.

Love fractured his right hand during preseason–an injury that forced him to miss three weeks of the regular season–and according to ESPN.com, an MRI over the weekend confirmed that he fractured the hand again during Thursday’s 101-97 win against the Denver Nuggets. The team says that they will set a date for his return after he is evaluated by a specialist in New York this week.

In 18 games this season, Love is leading the Wolves with 18.3 points per game and 14 rebounds, so without him the team is obviously at a significant disadvantage against almost any team it plays.

“He’s a huge part of what we were hoping to do and now we have to find other ways to do it,” coach Rick Adelman said before Saturday night’s game against Portland. “Even in the game in Denver, people talk about his shooting, but he had 13 rebounds at halftime and 13 points. That’s two big numbers. We have to find a way to manufacture those numbers and find a different way to play.”

With Rubio having missed the last three games with back spasms–an injury aside from his recovery from knee surgery that kept him out of most of December and all of November–Adelman’s job nurturing a young team has become tougher.

“I’ve never been through anything like this,” Adelman said. “You start out with Ricky from the very beginning, hoping to get him back and then it’s just been one thing after the other.”

“We’re 15-14 and I’m trying to figure out how we were able to get there. “This team does have resolve about them.”